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San Francisco • For the fourth straight BYU basketball game on Saturday night, and ninth time this season, coach Dave Rose started Brandon Davies, Brock Zylstra, Tyler Haws, Josh Sharp and Matt Carlino against the San Francisco Dons.

"For now, I think it is good," Rose said before the game. "We will stay with this. The one thing I think you all know is that we are a pretty competitive group, and our practices are pretty competitive. And if we feel that if changes need to be made, we will make them. But right now we feel good with this group."

Those five players started the first five games before senior Craig Cusick earned the starting point guard spot in games six through nine and junior college transfer Agustin Ambrosino got the nod over Sharp at the four spot in game six against Cal State Northridge.

Then Nate Austin got the call at the four spot against Eastern New Mexico and Baylor. And Cusick started at the two position (shooting guard) instead of Zylstra against Weber State, ENM and Baylor.

"We are improving every game," Carlino said. "We are getting better, and it is a good time to start getting better."

Give him a rest

Sophomore returned missionary Haws was averaging 32.5 minutes per game, the most on the team, entering Saturday's game against the Dons. Senior Davies was No. 2 in minutes, averaging 28.3 per game.

Rose said before the season started that he would look for opportunities to get Haws some rest here or there, fearful of the wear and tear on a guy who didn't play organized basketball the past two years.

"We really play through [Haws] and [Davies], and what is important now for us is to find guys we can play through when Ty and Brandon are out," Rose said. "And that's been a challenge for us. It really hurt us in the Baylor game [when Haws got into foul trouble]. Hopefully, we can improve on that, because it is really the nature of the beast. That's how the game is played."